Clearer multi-spectral images for security

RFEL pseudo colour pixel depiction

Fused image (bottom), with original visible light image (top left) and infra-red original (top right

Methods of combining images from infra-red and visual cameras for security applications are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

The latest announcements in the field are ‘colour noise suppression’ and ‘pseudo colour pixel depiction’ from Isle of Wight-based RFEL. The former is said to give more natural looking results in low-light conditions, and the later can be used to highlight key temperature differences in a scene.

Fusion as a concept is simple, according to the firm: create a single video of a scene that combines feature information from two cameras – one operating in visible spectrum and one in infra-red. However, the practical reality of achieving this with anything other than a crude overlay or averaging approach is that there are significant technical hurdles to overcome.

RFEL’s fusion algorithm collection for FPGA-based processing is called Video Fusion. It includes real-time warp capability to pixel-align the slightly different views seen by side-by-side cameras.

“Although there are many applications where a simple blend of two low-resolution images is acceptable, more and more users are seeking to go to the next level, and are demanding greater definition and high feature clarity from all sensor inputs in the fused result. With Video Fusion IP, we can offer significant performance increases,” said RFEL business development manager Wayne Cranwell.

RFEL colour noise suppression

Blended image with colour noise (left) compared to enhanced multi-resolution fusion with colour noise suppression (right)

Pseudo colour pixel depiction (top or page image) gives designers the ability to highlight key temperature differences in a scene with customisable colours for hot objects in preference to the natural-contrast grey levels. “This can be controlled in real-time, so that users do not have to compromise when their mission changes from situational awareness to surveillance,” said RFEL.

Video Fusion will be on-show in the UK Pavilion at at DSEI in ExCel, London on 15-18 September.

steve bush

Clearer multi-spectral images for security

RFEL pseudo colour pixel depiction

Fused image (bottom), with original visible light image (top left) and infra-red original (top right

Methods of combining images from infra-red and visual cameras for security applications are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

The latest announcements in the field are ‘colour noise suppression’ and ‘pseudo colour pixel depiction’ from Isle of Wight-based RFEL. The former is said to give more natural looking results in low-light conditions, and the later can be used to highlight key temperature differences in a scene.

Fusion as a concept is simple, according to the firm: create a single video of a scene that combines feature information from two cameras – one operating in visible spectrum and one in infra-red. However, the practical reality of achieving this with anything other than a crude overlay or averaging approach is that there are significant technical hurdles to overcome.

RFEL’s fusion algorithm collection for FPGA-based processing is called Video Fusion. It includes real-time warp capability to pixel-align the slightly different views seen by side-by-side cameras.

“Although there are many applications where a simple blend of two low-resolution images is acceptable, more and more users are seeking to go to the next level, and are demanding greater definition and high feature clarity from all sensor inputs in the fused result. With Video Fusion IP, we can offer significant performance increases,” said RFEL business development manager Wayne Cranwell.

RFEL colour noise suppression

Blended image with colour noise (left) compared to enhanced multi-resolution fusion with colour noise suppression (right)

Pseudo colour pixel depiction (top or page image) gives designers the ability to highlight key temperature differences in a scene with customisable colours for hot objects in preference to the natural-contrast grey levels. “This can be controlled in real-time, so that users do not have to compromise when their mission changes from situational awareness to surveillance,” said RFEL.

Video Fusion will be on-show in the UK Pavilion at at DSEI in ExCel, London on 15-18 September.

steve bush

Microlease to sell telecoms test gear from Viavi – formerly JDSU

ViaviTest gear leasing and rental firm Microlease is to sell new telecoms equipment from Viavi, the company formerly known as JDSU.

This is the second deal Microlease has signed to sell new equipment this year, the other was with Keysight (formerly Agilent, HP).

The Viavi portfolio is broad, covering wireline and wireless test up and down physical, virtual and hybrid networks from customer premise to the core network, handsets, and content.

It will be available for purchase or rent through Microlease, which includes equipment hire firm Livingston, and now offers new and used equipment to buy, lease, rent or rent-to-buy.

Viavi equipment is to be included in Microlease’s ‘easy2source’ programme, intended to save customer capital as they hire for a fixed period followed by optional discounted purchase if there is further need.

“The incessant pace at which technology progresses, with new industry standards emerging and performance benchmarks being elevated, dictates a more sophisticated approach to test equipment procurement,” said Microlease EMEA CEO Peter Collingwood.

Microlease’s deal with Viavi is not exclusive.

Viavi has been formed to handle network and services related activities of three merged companies: JDSU, Network Instruments and UK network software company Areiso. Left out of Viavi is JDSU’s laser busness, which is now a separate company called Lumentum.

steve bush

Microlease to sell telecoms test gear from Viavi – formerly JDSU

ViaviTest gear leasing and rental firm Microlease is to sell new telecoms equipment from Viavi, the company formerly known as JDSU.

This is the second deal Microlease has signed to sell new equipment this year, the other was with Keysight (formerly Agilent, HP).

The Viavi portfolio is broad, covering wireline and wireless test up and down physical, virtual and hybrid networks from customer premise to the core network, handsets, and content.

It will be available for purchase or rent through Microlease, which includes equipment hire firm Livingston, and now offers new and used equipment to buy, lease, rent or rent-to-buy.

Viavi equipment is to be included in Microlease’s ‘easy2source’ programme, intended to save customer capital as they hire for a fixed period followed by optional discounted purchase if there is further need.

“The incessant pace at which technology progresses, with new industry standards emerging and performance benchmarks being elevated, dictates a more sophisticated approach to test equipment procurement,” said Microlease EMEA CEO Peter Collingwood.

Microlease’s deal with Viavi is not exclusive.

Viavi has been formed to handle network and services related activities of three merged companies: JDSU, Network Instruments and UK network software company Areiso. Left out of Viavi is JDSU’s laser busness, which is now a separate company called Lumentum.

steve bush

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

The collapse in demand for smartphones has caused a severe drop in foundry orders for mobile SoCs.

TSMC saw sales drop from $2.48 billion in July to $2.06 billion in August – a fall of over 17%.

At UMC August sales were down 4% and the company said its Q3 wafer shipments may fall sequentially by as much as 5%, while its ASP may fall 3%.

The reason given by both companies is excessive inventory in the mobile SoC supply chain which made customers cut back on orders.

It was the third lowest monthly sales figure for TSMC this year after February’s $1.9 billion and June’s $1.84 billion.

In the first eight months of the year TSMC had sales of $17.6 billion – 23.6% more than in the first eight months of 2014.

TSMC says Q3 sales will be between $6.33 billion and $6.42 billion.

See also: Foundry revenues grow 16% – Gartner

See also: Foundry sales outgrow industry sales

Read more TSMC stories on Electronics Weekly »

 

david manners

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

The collapse in demand for smartphones has caused a severe drop in foundry orders for mobile SoCs.

TSMC saw sales drop from $2.48 billion in July to $2.06 billion in August – a fall of over 17%.

At UMC August sales were down 4% and the company said its Q3 wafer shipments may fall sequentially by as much as 5%, while its ASP may fall 3%.

The reason given by both companies is excessive inventory in the mobile SoC supply chain which made customers cut back on orders.

It was the third lowest monthly sales figure for TSMC this year after February’s $1.9 billion and June’s $1.84 billion.

In the first eight months of the year TSMC had sales of $17.6 billion – 23.6% more than in the first eight months of 2014.

TSMC says Q3 sales will be between $6.33 billion and $6.42 billion.

See also: Foundry revenues grow 16% – Gartner

See also: Foundry sales outgrow industry sales

Read more TSMC stories on Electronics Weekly »

 

david manners

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

Smartphone demand collapse hits foundry orders

The collapse in demand for smartphones has caused a severe drop in foundry orders for mobile SoCs.

TSMC saw sales drop from $2.48 billion in July to $2.06 billion in August – a fall of over 17%.

At UMC August sales were down 4% and the company said its Q3 wafer shipments may fall sequentially by as much as 5%, while its ASP may fall 3%.

The reason given by both companies is excessive inventory in the mobile SoC supply chain which made customers cut back on orders.

It was the third lowest monthly sales figure for TSMC this year after February’s $1.9 billion and June’s $1.84 billion.

In the first eight months of the year TSMC had sales of $17.6 billion – 23.6% more than in the first eight months of 2014.

TSMC says Q3 sales will be between $6.33 billion and $6.42 billion.

See also: Foundry revenues grow 16% – Gartner

See also: Foundry sales outgrow industry sales

Read more TSMC stories on Electronics Weekly »

 

david manners

Taiwan’s IC design houses consolidating

Taiwan's IC design houses consolidating

Taiwan’s IC design houses consolidating

The Taiwanese chip industry is in a state of accelerated consolidation with MediaTek acting as the consolidator.

The independent Taiwan design community is now under notice that it will have to cope with a powerful competitor or a new owner.

MediaTek already has a number of local chip companies under its belt, the most notable being MStar which was acquired last year.

Earlier this year it acquired Alpha Imaging for UAV chips and Chingis Technology for flash chips.

Now it is planning to use MStar to take over the analogue IC design company ILI Technology (Ilitek) for $115 million while it makes an $890 million bid for analogue IC designer Richtek under its own name.

According to Digitimes, the resultant merger could account for half Taiwan’s IC design revenues and will put the leading independent houses – Novatek Microelectronics, Himax Technologies, Realtek Semiconductor, FocalTech Systems, Raydium Semiconductor, Elan Microelectronics, Sitronix Technology and Silicon Motion Technology – under scrutiny as possible takeover targets.

Mediatek has already absorbed Andes Technology for MCUs, Goodix for touchscreen controller ICs, and mCube for MEMS.

Read more Mediatek stories on Electronics Weekly »

david manners

Taiwan’s IC design houses consolidating

Taiwan's IC design houses consolidating

Taiwan’s IC design houses consolidating

The Taiwanese chip industry is in a state of accelerated consolidation with MediaTek acting as the consolidator.

The independent Taiwan design community is now under notice that it will have to cope with a powerful competitor or a new owner.

MediaTek already has a number of local chip companies under its belt, the most notable being MStar which was acquired last year.

Earlier this year it acquired Alpha Imaging for UAV chips and Chingis Technology for flash chips.

Now it is planning to use MStar to take over the analogue IC design company ILI Technology (Ilitek) for $115 million while it makes an $890 million bid for analogue IC designer Richtek under its own name.

According to Digitimes, the resultant merger could account for half Taiwan’s IC design revenues and will put the leading independent houses – Novatek Microelectronics, Himax Technologies, Realtek Semiconductor, FocalTech Systems, Raydium Semiconductor, Elan Microelectronics, Sitronix Technology and Silicon Motion Technology – under scrutiny as possible takeover targets.

Mediatek has already absorbed Andes Technology for MCUs, Goodix for touchscreen controller ICs, and mCube for MEMS.

Read more Mediatek stories on Electronics Weekly »

david manners

Synopsys tunes ARC EM processors for low latency apps

Synopsys has added to its processor IP offering with new ARC EM processors with an enhanced instruction set architecture that combines RISC and DSP processing with support for an XY memory system.

Synopsys tunes ARC EM processors for low latency apps

Synopsys tunes ARC EM processors for low latency apps

The EM9D and EM11D processor cores benefit from being able to retrieve instructions and data from memories that are tightly coupled to the processor pipeline. This can reduce the number of accesses to system memory which improves latency.

The ARC MetaWare development tool now offers full C/C++ programming support for the cores’ DSP instructions and XY memory as well as a library of DSP functions.

The toolkit also includes an ITU-T base-ops library for developing voice codecs.

These include FFT and DCT, FIR and IIR filters, as well as vector and matrix math functions.

Likely applications may include speech recognition and audio processing.

EM DSP cores implement a three stage pipeline. These new cores integrate separate X and Y memories with hardware support for address generation and DMA to move data in and out of the memories.

This enables a sustained throughput of one 32×32 MAC operation or two 16×16 MAC operations per clock cycle with minimal energy and area overhead.

These new processors also support full integer, fractional divide and square root operations, unaligned loads/stores and bitstream parsing.

These features enable the EM9D and EM11D to deliver the additional DSP performance required to execute complex sensor algorithms, as well as improve processing efficiency for a range of audio formats including MP3, SBC, OPUS and AAC LC.

 

 

 

Richard Wilson